


but you learned how to bloom in the spaces

by ceedawkes



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Pining, canon-typical oblivious jon, spoilers through season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:28:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23136946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceedawkes/pseuds/ceedawkes
Summary: Of course, though, that’s completely ridiculous, because Martin is as far from a predator as it’s possible to be. Not unless predatory creatures have taken to wearing knit pullovers and pinning dog memes to their workstations. || Martin invites Jon to lunch, multiple times. Jon attempts to discern what his nefarious, secret hidden motives are. Set during Season Two
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 26
Kudos: 205





	but you learned how to bloom in the spaces

“...as an aside, our research turned up little in the way of usable information, except to confirm that the call appeared to be coming from...in _side_ the house. Clearly a sort of technological malfunction--”

“Jon?”

The voice is gentle, but Jon jumps all the same, reaching reflexively for the tape recorder, though he couldn’t say whether it was to make certain it was off or still running. Either way, his fingers relax, bumping the buttons uselessly when he sees the cause of the interruption. “Martin. What is it, can’t you see I’m in the middle of recording a statement?”

“Ah, sorry, sorry.” Martin holds up both hands, placatingly, hovering in the doorway, like the recording room has some sort of impassable barrier around it. _If only,_ Jon thinks, pushing back from the desk.

Then: _His sweater cuffs are tattered. Has he been worrying at the loose bits again? I’ve told him he’ll unravel his entire wardrobe, at that rate._ If he were to guess, Jon would assume that Martin owned exclusively woolen, knit sweaters, perhaps hung in a neat row in his closet at home. Though no, more likely piled on a chair, freshly laundered mixed in with the still-clean-enough, so that when Martin reaches for one to pull on each morning, sleepy-eyed and absent, he grabs the mustard-yellow one with the marmalade stain, rather than the clean cherry-red.

Then: _What does it matter, why am I thinking about Martin in the morning?_ and aloud, interrupting himself: “Well. Nevermind. I’m nearly done anyway. What is it?”

Martin shifts back, then forward, still never crossing the threshold of the open doorway. Jon imagines for a minute that the other man is staring at the still-fresh pockmarks Prentiss had left, like neatly-peppered buckshot wounds. But no, Martin is looking him in the eyes, his own soft and blue and never wavering. “I was heading down to the cafe, wondered if you wanted to come with? It’s close enough to lunch. I heard Rosie say they have egg salad today.” A pause, Martin adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses up his nose. Martin smiling. “You like egg salad, right?”

It’s scarcely a question, more a statement of fact. Jon looks back at the statement, at the tape recorder. He _does_ like egg salad. “...if there are sweet pickles in, I’m not eating it,” he says at last, pressing the stop button and reaching for his coat.

* * *

The next day, again there’s Martin in the doorway, waiting until after the statement has been read before gently knocking. This time Jon doesn’t startle nearly as much, and doesn’t wait to be convinced. The sandwiches are tuna, not nearly as appealing as egg salad, but passable. Jon begins to make a comment about having not eaten breakfast, just to fill the silence as they slide their trays along, but then Martin remarks, “I’d imagine you haven’t eaten yet, have you, Jon?”

Jon gives him a quick, searching, sideways glance, wondering if he’s been -- spying, eavesdropping, following him? Wondering if this is how it had happened for Gertrude, too, the vague comments that revealed how closely she’d been watched. He has to be more cautious. He cannot let his guard down.

Except then, he notes that the sweater today is mint-green, with the same fraying along the cuffs. And Jon pokes at the back of Martin’s hand with his salad fork when he notes the loose-thread-worrying. “Stop that,” he grumbles, impaling a cherry tomato, then waving it for emphasis. “You’ll pull it to bits.”

“Sorry.” Martin is decidedly not sorry. He is, instead, smiling as he takes a spoonful of mediocre chili and promptly dribbles it down his front. Jon is already reaching for a handful of napkins, the fingers of his left hand clumsy, each movement pulling at the still-healing wounds.

So he sort of smushes the napkins against the spot on Martin’s chest, silently, lets his assistant reach to take them, then returns to his salad without another word. Martin is still smiling, which is _exceptionally_ suspicious, but then he’s also made off with two oatmeal cookies, when he doesn’t even like oatmeal cookies. Jon, on the other hand, very much likes them, and is easily talked into eating them both.

He decides to stop noticing how much Martin is smiling at him. There are other, more important things to worry about, like removing all the raisins from the otherwise perfect cookies.

* * *

After that, it becomes a bit of a routine. Jon doesn’t record a statement every day, spends plenty of time in research or follow-up, or compiling other evidence alongside Tim and Sasha. Tim is reserved, distant, and Sasha is the same as ever, so neither of them invite him to lunch. It’s only Martin. Only on the days when Jon records his statements.

For a while he suspects that Martin must be waiting outside the door and listening, waiting for the telltale signs that Jon is weary or unnerved and taking advantage of his weakened state. Like some manner of predator, stalking its prey until the most opportune moment.

Of course, though, that’s completely ridiculous, because Martin is as far from a predator as it’s possible to be. Not unless predatory creatures have taken to wearing knit pullovers and pinning dog memes to their workstations. Besides that, the recording room is soundproof.

So what then, is Martin’s motive? Certainly not conversation, as their lunch talk mainly concerns the menu, and occasional vague comments on the weather. Except when it doesn’t, except when it’s Martin recounting some inane story about traveling via the tube and seeing a pigeon fighting a rat, or an in-depth description of the cat he petted while out conducting interviews. Jon only listens to see if he can discern what Martin might be plotting. Also because he likes cats.

He listens, sandwich in one hand, chin propped in the other, and he even occasionally laughs. It’s a tired, groggy sound, so rarely used that the first time it happens, it surprises even Jon. Martin’s ever-present smile appears to double in brightness at the sound, and Jon thinks abruptly of the sun shining.

The sweater is the banana-yellow one today, though, and that’s clearly the reason for this thought. Clearly.

* * *

And then one day Jon is not recording a statement. He’s sitting at his desk, sorting through some photographs Sasha had taken, black-and-white polaroids of a potential scene of a potential haunting, when Martin is in the doorway and asking him, “Would you like to go for a cuppa, Jon? It’s a nice day out, and the corner cafe’s not too far a walk.”

It’s more words than the invitation usually consists of, and it’s nowhere near lunch. It’s also the first time Martin’s invited Jon somewhere outside of the institute. Most importantly, Jon _isn’t recording a statement_. He’s just sitting there, photos spread out before him on the desk, pencil stuck into his pulled-back hair, and he’s staring at Martin in abject confusion.

Finally, slowly, as if this is a fact Martin might not be aware of: “We’ve got tea in the breakroom, Martin.”

It’s like hitting the dimmer on a lightswitch. Inside his light blue sweater (which matches his eyes, which is quite possibly the most absurd thought Jon has _ever had_ ), Martin’s broad shoulders droop, making him seem suddenly -- small. His hand tightens on the doorknob, almost imperceptibly, and he isn’t looking at Jon. Hasn’t, in fact, been looking at Jon throughout this entire brief, bewildering conversation. He’s been looking at the ceiling and the floor and the bit of wall above Jon’s left ear, all within the same sentence.

And now he’s looking nowhere in particular, letting out a soft exhale. His ears, beneath the fringe of overgrown hair, are red, and the glare on his glasses makes it hard to tell, but Jon could almost think his eyes are damp. “Ah,” Martin says at last. “I’ll -- make you a cup, then?” It doesn’t sound very hopeful. In fact, it sounds not like Martin at all.

Jon reaches up for the pencil, pulls it out from his hair and twiddles it in his fingers. “Well. That would -- yes. If you’d care to,” he stammers. Jon doesn’t stammer, but he does here, with Martin looking deflated and dull in his doorway.

Martin nods and leaves, without another word. He doesn’t return with the tea, though when Jon ventures to the breakroom several hours later, he finds it stone cold and overbrewed, resting on the counter. The mug is the brightly-patterned one, with the multicolored cats wearing ties. Jon takes a couple half-hearted sips, tongue curling back at the too-bitter taste, then dumps it down the drain.

* * *

“Supplemental: Martin hasn’t been by for nearly a week.

“...no, that’s -- that’s misleading. He’s been _here_ , he’s come to work and all that, of course he has. If he’d gone missing again, I imagine we’d all assume the worst, worm-related causes.

“No, it’s...he hasn’t come to invite me to lunch. I-I realize how absurd that sounds, except he’d been doing it so regularly for...for weeks. I can’t even recall how often, now. I’d nearly come to...to expect it.

“...I suppose that’s absurd. Perhaps he’d gotten what he’d meant to get, some sort of...personal information I’d let slip during our conversations. Perhaps that’s all it ever was. If so, then why doesn’t he _do something_ about it? Something besides just…walking the other way whenever I approach?

“I’m...being absurd. I could just ask him. I _should_ just ask him. _Why haven’t you been inviting me to lunch?_ Like that. Yes, that’s not suspicious at _all._

“ _I’ve missed you, lately_ , then? That’s more _truthful._

“...it’s. It _is_ more truthful. I _have_ missed him. I’ve missed -- the talks, and the company and those _sweaters_ and...I’ve missed him smiling at me from the doorway. I’ve missed how his...his glasses slip down his nose and nearly fall off and I need to remind him of it and how his hair curls around his ears and how he blushes when I say something sarcastic and how he laughs. I’ve missed him looking at me. Nobody else here _looks at me_. Not like Martin.

“...oh _no._ I’ve. I’m -- oh _no._ I’m a _complete bloody idiot._ I’ve got to -- I need to. Find him. Um, end supplemental.”

* * *

It’s harder than it should be to track Martin down. It’s not exactly difficult to locate a tall, broad-set man in a purple sweater on a regular day, but of course it is in the Magnus Institute. It’d be too _easy_ otherwise.

But eventually Jon careens around a corner in the library, panting heavily, glasses askew on his face, and sees Martin sitting at a table, chin in his hands, glumly flicking through a book on obscure, esoteric symbology. He looks up as Jon approaches, and the intent to get up and bolt is briefly evident on his face. But that would mean making too much noise in the library, which isn’t very nice to Harriet, so he stays put, frozen, staring up at Jon with those big, woeful eyes.

Jon leans both hands on the table, still out of breath, hair falling in his face. The words take a moment to get out, and when they do, they’re -- well, they’re suitably underwhelming: “I want...I want a cup...of tea. Please.”

Martin’s forehead creases in confusion, and he looks around slowly at the rows of bookshelves surrounding them. It’d be almost comical, in any other situation, except Jon is about to die of overexertion, and there’s a splotch of ink on the purple shoulder of Martin’s sweater, and suddenly he’s instead going to die from the wave of _tenderness_ that crashes over him. He gulps in a breath, shakes his head and reaches out a scarred hand. It rests clumsily, over Martin’s.

“I-I mean I...I want to go...get tea. With you,” Jon clarifies, fingers curling around Martin’s, aware how warm, how soft he is. How very right it feels to be holding onto him, in this tiny, impossible way, in the middle of an impossible place.

Then Martin’s eyes are widening, and his glasses are slipping down his nose as he looks up at Jon and searches for what to say. And this time Jon reaches out himself, nudges the frames back into place with his thumb, feeling his neck warm with embarrassment and hope and despair all at once. Because Martin isn’t _saying anything._

But then Martin exhales, turns his hand over underneath Jon’s so their palms slide together and their fingers tangle. He exhales, only it’s a laugh this time, and he shakes his head and thank every god there is, he’s _smiling._ “It’s -- nearly lunchtime, Jon. We’d miss egg salad day,” Martin says, Martin _teases_ , squeezing Jon’s hand.

Jon huffs out a laugh and crumples into a seat beside Martin, elbow knocking to his, shoulders bumping. It’s more than he’s touched another human being in years, and it should set him alight with awkwardness, but it feels like the most natural thing in the world. “I can live without egg salad for another day,” he says, pushing his hair out of his face. “I want to go outside and. See the sun and the birds and sit down in a cafe and drink tea. With you. Right now.”

Martin smiles, shifting towards Jon and nodding, with his hair in his face and his eyes fixed on Jon, looking at him, _seeing him._ The book in front of him is nudged to the ground with a thump, and Jon will apologize to Harriet for it later. Because now he’s ducking forward and bumping noses with Martin when he kisses him, clumsy and soft and unsure.

Fortunately, Martin is sure. Martin is sure, reaching to swipe his thumb over Jon’s cheekbone, cradling his face for that moment more when Jon rocks back, letting that one kiss linger between them for a heartbeat of time more. Then he pulls back, stands, his hand still holding tight to Jon’s. “Come on, then,” he says, softly.

As it turns out, the cafe has sub-par tea, but their oatmeal cookies are superb, if a little overpopulated with raisins. Martin helps Jon pick them out, leaving them in a little pile on his saucer, forgotten as they sit in the sunshine and sip the watery tea and talk. The cookies are good enough that Jon decides he’ll invite Martin out again, sometime. Maybe tomorrow.

Maybe every single day.


End file.
